Can I replace an object with another object and keep animation?
The best way to replace a "replace" button. :)

Create a proxy object that will be animated. Create as many ships as needed. naming them as object and mesh can be useful.


change the mesh of the proxy object with another ship.





The same animated object can be any ship you like with the same animation.

The resulting object is a linked duplicated, same as AltD. They share the same mesh. If you need an independant duplicate (same as ShiftD), press the button beside F (normally 2, counting objects sharing the same mesh) to make it a new object independent of the original. Use F button to give the mesh a fake user before changing it if you want it to be saved in the .blend even if no object use it (else it will disapear when you reload your .blend file).